Author's Note – If you don't knowby now who really owns the characters, there's no hope for you.

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Chapter Twenty-Four

New Day

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"Illyana?"

"Brother!"

Colossus grinned as Illyana, showing energy that she had been lacking for years, leapt off the bed and into his arms.

"While I'd like to do several follow-up scans to ensure that the treatment worked properly, the chances of anything going wrong are minimal." Clark smiled.

"Thank you!" Colossus grinned, reaching out with his free hand to clap Clark on his shoulder. "I had almost given up hope… thank you!"

"I have set aside a small suite for you and your sister." Xavier said from behind them. "Two bedrooms, one bathroom and a living/dining room with kitchenette, although you'll probably want to join us for our meals. Martha is a truly excellent cook."

"Thank you." Colossus repeated, tears of joy trickling down his cheeks.

"Welcome to the X-men, Colossus." Xavier said, offering his hand. Colossus took it without hesitation. "I hope you like it here, although I have an offer to make. I've managed to track down and contact several new mutants, teenagers, and having another mentor around to help look after them…?"

Colossus nodded. "Of course. I look after little sister, how much harder can it be? Ow!"

Illyana folded her arms and glared at the brother that she had just slapped while everyone else somehow managed not to laugh.

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The crashed plane slowly slid to a halt, coming to rest against a tree and leaving a long trail of torn vegetaion marking its attempt at landing. After several minutes had passed, two figures, one significantly larger than the other, pulled themselves out and collapsed on the forest floor. A third figure jumped out and stood proudly on the remains of the small fuselage.

"Heh! You see? I told you I could get us back!"

The large figure rolled over with a groan while the smaller one fixed him with a glare.

"Shut it, Toad. You almost killed us with that landing."

"But I didn't… woah!"

The ground shook, dislodging Todd from his perch and sending him tumbling to the ground, causing him to land by one of the now-detached wheels. "Watcha do that for?"

"Look, once we can walk, we'll head back home and decide what to do. For now, shut it. And where the hell did you get your pilot's license?"

"License? Who needs a license?" Todd scoffed. "I used my mad arcade skillz."

Lance and Fred exchanged a long look, then Fred slumped back down.

"We can kill him later."

"Yeah."

"Hey!"

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"Final tally, sir." The agent said, handing an e-pad over. "One primary console, two intact scanner drones, two partially disassembled drones. We think we've managed to get most of it accounted for, some of it got severely damaged during the assault. We've also managed to recover almost seventy cubic meters of the green material… Kryptonite… and are transporting it to the primary base for processing."

"Excellent." Fury said. "Cutter, your report please?"

"No sign of Magneto or any of the escaped Acolytes at this time, sir." The dark-haired woman replied. "Preliminary interrogations of the captured have proven… less than useful. They refuse to say or do anything that they see as a betrayal. It could take some time to develop any useful intelligence."

"Understood." Fury noted. "Keep me informed."

"Of course, sir."

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"You wanted to speak to me, Trask?"

"Yes, Mister Creed." Boliver said, meeting the gaze of the leader of the Friends of Humanity. "My sources in SHIELD have given me an unusual piece of technology and several bits of information you should be aware of. It would seem that Superman isn't a mutant after all."

"Not a mutant?" Creed said slowly. "Interesting. What is he? An enhanced human?"

"An alien sir, apparently the last of his kind."

Graydon seemed to darken with rage. "So he came here hoping to repopulate his race using ours. Unacceptable!"

"We did manage to get a sample of his technology, sir." Boliver said quickly. "A drone, one containing some very impressive computational crystals. My scientists are already working on how to duplicate them… sir, each crystal is the equivalent of a low-level supercomputer, with a processing speed almost an order of magnitude faster than anything we have! When we put one of the chips into the prototype, its combat efficiency rose by over three hundred percent!"

Graydon Creed froze, then his gaze sharpened.

"Incredible. Technology like that is wasted on aliens. How many of these crystals are there?"

"Eleven, sir. We are still examining the rest of the technology for more additions to our arsenal. The sensors look… interesting, but they seem to contain and rely on several odd elements that we cannot get."

Graydon nodded. "Use six of those crystals in the first flight of the Sentinels, send the others to the research stations to see if they can be duplicated. Humanity will prevail!"

Boliver Trask snapped to attention. "Yes sir! Humanity will prevail!"

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"Father, do you want me to do anything?"

"Not at this time, Pietro." Magneto replied, looking out of the window of the chalet at the looming mountains. "We must wait for some of the fuss to die down, to move to early is to be captured and all our work will be set to naught."

"Like it already… oh hell. Dad?"

Magneto turned and saw Pietro staring at the television. Looking at the screen, his fists clenched as he saw Superman lifting a collapsed crane off several vehicles, allowing the emergency services access to the injured.

"Dad… how can he be alive? I trapped him in that collapsing dimension…"

"If he had got out, he would have been part of the team that tried to destroy the future of the mutants…" Magneto mused. "For him to have waited, he must either have been incapacitated, and I see no sign of injury, or… or he's a clone!"

"Is that possible?"

"I see no other solution." Magneto sighed. "We may need to secure some of his DNA and create a clone of him ourselves. Raise it to be loyal to us and we would have a great weapon. I vowed never to contact him again, but it seems that we may need the services of Sinestro."

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"…the hell?"

The trio stood before the smoking wreckage of what was once a house.

"This isn't good." Fred rumbled. "Where do we live now?"

"I dunno." Lance said slowly, then he spat in disgust. "Fucking Magneto! Never should have joined him. He's really screwed us over."

"I'm pleased to hear you say that." A familiar voice purred and all three spun round.

"Mystique?"

Mystique smirked at Todd's yelp. "You have a choice. Go your own way, join Xavier or come with me. I have a new house ready. You chose to return to Bayville, Pietro did not. I think we can assume that you… no longer wish to follow his lead."

"And Magneto…?" Lance asked slowly.

"Can go to hell!" Mystique snarled before regaining control of herself. The trio exchanged glances, then Lance spoke.

"Okay, I'm in… for now."

"Same here."

"What he said."

"Excellent." Mystique smiled. "If you'll follow me, you can get settled in."

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"How long will you be gone?" Xavier asked, looking up at the Javelin as Clark replaced the access hatch and floated down.

"Probably several weeks." Clark said. "Now I've got the crystal matrix properly aligned, I think it's time to return to Krypton for a look round. According to records, there was a sister planet named Argo, about the size of our moon, which had several domed cities on it. If even one of them survived…"

"I see, and I understand." Xavier smiled. "I wish you luck on your journey. Have you already said goodbye to the others?"

"He has." Martha said from behind them, "But we decided to see you off, anyway."

"Thanks, mom." Clark grinned, giving her a quick kiss on the cheek, then moving round the group, distributing handshakes and hugs impartially. "I'll see you all when I get back."

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Cain Marko crested the hill and stopped, staring at the scene before him. The shoreside village was the first he had seen since Heimdall had sent him back to Earth, and he still didn't know where he was, but the sight before him was proof beyond doubt that it wasn't any of the countries he deemed civilised.

Over half the huts were damaged or on fire, with corpses lying around, but the true horror was in the middle where a gang of men clad as soldiers were tying up the widows and daughters of the dead, stripping their clothing off as they did so and laughing at the wailing and crying of the females.

"That… is not right…"

Clenching his fists, Juggernaut strode towards the village. One of the soldiers saw him coming and called out a warning, but Juggernaut simply accelerated, loping towards the scum who would all die if he had anything to do with it. Bullets bounced off him, then he was amongst them, grabbing one of the trucks and swinging it up and over as he tore into them with a fury that owed nothing to Cyttorak.

After the last of the soldiers was dead, Cain started to untie the women. As he worked, he ignored the rivulets of blood spreading across the road, heading towards the damaged sign, the sign which had only a fragment of the writing on it still visible.

…LCOME TO SUNNY GENO…

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Author's Afternote – Well, that's season 1 (although I did scramble the timeline a bit, butterfly effect and all that). Yes, I grabbed Magneto's plan from the X-men film and upped it in scope. When/If I do season 2 (which will not be for several months at the very least, probably not until near christmas, sorry), several of the chekov's guns I planted will be fired. The Sentinels will be multiple and dangerous, for instance, and as for where Juggernaut is…well, evil laugh time!

I hope you enjoyed it, I certainly had a blast writing it. Interesting how one man can make a difference…

TheBeardedOne.

PS – The next chapter is a teaser/trailer for the sequel, just to whet your appitite.